“The kitchen counter clutter that is tableau of family life. The tear in the eye of a proud dad on his daughter’s first day of school. Children and their earnest expressions. I cannot separate that part of me that sees compositional elements come together naturally, perfectly, and I can imagine them recorded timelessly in black and white photography. Some of my most delightful images were taken spontaneously because I had my camera loaded and ready to go and I got lucky. Everything came together. Is that serendipity?” she asks, then giggles.

Perhaps it was serendipitous of Carol’s father to give her a little Instamatic 110 for Christmas in 1974. It certainly changed Carol’s life. Since that moment almost 30 years ago Carol has been photographing prolifically, and in recent years, professionally. “I have albums upon albums from high school, college and graduate school. My friends were always so kind to indulge me. They’d sit with me for hours pouring over those images.”

Carol and her lifelong friend Randa lived meagerly and traveled extensively whenever and however they could. “We scraped together money for youth hostels and barely had money for bus fare, but I always had film in my camera.” The two friends traveled from Barcelona to Buenos Aires, Paris to Penobscot, and along the way, Carol Darr became a very good photographer.

In recent years Carol has turned her attention away from shooting the likes of lighthouses and the everyday picturesque to focus her attention primarily on children. The mother of three young children, Carol has limitless opportunities to train the eye on her small subjects. “I love to watch little ones. They are delighted by the simplest things and confounded by them, too. And their emotions parade across their faces.... It’s not the perfect smile I want to capture with my camera, but the unique characteristics that help define the individual... the nuances.” She pauses, frowning, searching for the right words. “I am honored when someone invites me to photograph their children or a family event. When I work with children I never manipulate them with props or poses. Children are very much ‘in the moment’ and the beauty of that child in that moment is what I hope to capture. When I shoot weddings it is in a photojournalistic style, unobtrusively documenting the day and the drama as it unfolds.”

Are some subjects or some events more challenging to photograph than others? Again, a thoughtful pause. “Yessss,” Carol drawls her answer. “I confess I’ve crossed my fingers at times, waiting for proofs to develop, but I’ve learned that when the challenge is with a child, I can trust my instincts as a mother. And when the challenge is technical, I can rely on the wealth of information I’ve learned from study and from other professionals over the years. I’ve been influenced by many photographers. The ones I admire most are the brave ones; the ones who make the unsafe pictures. Each time I pick up my camera, I remind myself to be grand, to be daring.”

Is there one aspect of photography that most appeals to Carol? Is it the artistry? The challenge? Carol crosses the room and retrieves a dictionary. “I think it’s what I tried to say earlier,” she explains. She flips the pages and stops somewhere in the S’s trailing her finger down a column until she finds what she is looking for. “Yes! See? ‘Serendipity: the phenomenon of finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for.’”

Copyright 2003, M&L Publishing, all rights reserved.